Hello everyone, and welcome back.
I'm writing this during the afternoon, and we're all hard at work. About a dozen of my fellows are in the other room, sorting the logistics of the competition which is barreling down on us so quickly. We chose the final thirty-two students, and now we're assigning trainers and planning the final day which we're all looking forward to.
This week has been amazing.
It started off on Sunday Morning. Mandala has gotten very involved with the choir at Sandhills Presbyterian Church, and so at half past eight that morning, Laura, Elizabeth, Anna Harvey, Chris, Seth, and I all piled into one of the vans and left for practice. We've been doing this for a few weeks now, and we all enjoy it very much. We love this chance to apply what we've learned about music in a very real way, every week.
Caleb has been serving the church as well. For the past three weeks, he's been teaching Sunday school, educating the people of Sandhills in music and beauty, and why it all matters. He's been very open with us in class about what he has learned while teaching us, and it's been great to see him speaking to a large room, and knowing that we've helped him get there. He is our teacher, but he's an integral part of our fellowship, and we're glad we can be a part of his life outside of Mandala.
The rest of our week was pretty standard. Again, when it comes to physics, Mrs. Bortins has given us a lot of autonomy. Musically, our days have been a little more intense. We only have two more months until the concert, so we're all working hard to make sure we've learned everything and learned it well. The music counsel spent Thursday afternoon trying to find a better venue than our church, but I believe the consensus is that Sandhills is the best place for us to perform. We want our concert to be the best it can possibly be, so we're all working our hardest on it.
While the week was fairly normal, our weekend was definitely the highlight of the semester so far. We had another guest come to speak to us. His name was James Dutton, and we invited him because he is one of the privileged few who has slipped away from earth's gravity and joined Yuri Gagarin in space. He's spent his whole life in pursuit of this one goal, and a few years ago, he finally blasted off to spend ten days on the International Space Station. He had some of the best stories I've heard in a very long time. In the time I spent with him, I was impressed most with his character and his faith. The Lord has done great things with and through him, and he was just so encouraging to be around.
We covered a multitude of subjects in class. He talked about what exactly goes into a launch and explained the physics behind successfully docking with the ISS. He also talked about the past and future of NASA and of space travel in general. For devotions on Friday and Saturday, we had Pastor Skogen and his wife respectively, and they both shared very important lessons with us. Mr. Dutton wasn't afraid to continue the discussions those spawned into his class time. The weather was perfect that Friday afternoon, and so most of us headed to the soccer field where we played a solid hour and a half of ultimate Frisbee. Mr. Dutton and his ten year old son played hard and well, and we all enjoyed it.
Mr. Dutton's visit was overshadowed slightly by the wedding between April Yachanin and Robert Bortins. If you remember, April was one of the chaperones in Italy. The Bortins graciously invited all of us to the wedding and spread invitations to the reception and the rehearsal dinner between all of us. The rehearsal was on Friday, and those of us who would go to the reception stayed behind and had dinner with our guest. He had some great stories to share. After dinner, we casually swing danced, and we even got Mr. Dutton and his son to join us for a few dances.
The wedding the next day was absolutely wonderful. The chapel was elegant and beautiful, the ceremony was rich, simple, and just the right length, the bride was stunning, and the groom was a picture of manliness. After the ceremony, we parted ways, and while Mr. Dutton was welcome at the reception, he chose to go to Cracker Barrel with the ones who weren't invited. Apparently it was a great night.
While they were eating pancakes and probably making terrible space puns, (they were a running theme) Anna, Anna, Brooke, Seth, Samuel, and I wandered the town until we found the reception. Mrs. Bortins invited us over the others because she knew we would appreciate the dancing more than anyone else. Well, once the cake was cut and the dancing really started, we took control of the dance floor and had a wonderful time. Elizabeth somehow found her way to the reception halfway through the night and she surprised us with some pretty enthusiastic dancing for the rest of the night. Mrs. Bortins was beautiful and funny and happy to be dancing at her son's wedding, and we all loved her.
We danced and danced and finally returned home at midnight, happy and blissful. It was a night to remember. When we rose early for church the next morning, our guest was gone, the wedding was over, and life was back to normal, but everything was colored with an attitude of joy for what was one of the best weekends of our year together. We were blessed to be able to share it with another guest: Seth's younger sister, Paige. She goes home tomorrow, to everyone's chagrin. Nobody likes to see a Vanderway leave.
So that was our week. Something is always amazing us here, and I know normal life after Mandala is going to be so strange.
Until next time,
Barnabas
